


PUCK IT!

by arcadevia



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Alternate Universe - Hockey, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Hockey, Hockey AU, M/M, Minor Adam/Shiro (Voltron), Mutual Pining, Past Ryan/Lance (Voltron), Rivalry, uhhh later on tho
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-04-17
Updated: 2020-04-17
Packaged: 2021-03-02 03:53:39
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,664
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23708695
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/arcadevia/pseuds/arcadevia
Summary: From the moment Voltron University’s hockey team stepped foot onto the ice this season, the players (and coach) have never had a dull practice, as two teammates are constantly at each other’s throats in a flurry of petty fistfights and snappy insults.Lance, hopeful (and a bit cocky), just wants a shot at getting the recognition he’s fought to earn amongst a family of prodigies. Unfortunately, he’s out of luck when Keith, a rising hockey star, outshines his efforts and renders him nothing short of absolutely livid.After their umpteenth squabble of the season, Shiro has reached his breaking point, and the pair’s chance to play in Voltron’s last game is compromised if they don’t start learning to work together.Extra hours, extra teamwork, extra devotion, but all they wanna do is just say“Fuck it.”Edit: (This fic is currently on hold while I’m finishing up other works)
Relationships: Keith/Lance (Voltron)
Comments: 2
Kudos: 13





	PUCK IT!

“WHOO! Break his nose! C’mon!” One of the boys hollar from the edge of the rink.

“Ugh, you guys fight like little _girls_ …”

“BOYS! Get your asses straight!” Shiro’s temper reaches it breaking point and he makes his way over from a few yards away.

Lance grabs hold on the loose strap of Keith’s helmet and flings it across the ice, having no time to watch the thing scatter when he’s too busy getting a move on with his hair, which is another easy grab after swatting an arm out the way. “I‘ll fuckin’ kill you, Kogane,” He grunts and Keith only grunts back, staring viciously back through curtains of shaggy black hair. He pulls Lance by the collar of his jersey that ends up giving a nasty _rip_ , then swings for his nose.

“I’ll fuckin kill ya,” he says again, after tugging his head back last second. Keith’s fist flies by with a _whoosh_ but it comes back scarily fast and manages to hit the sharp edge of his jaw. Keith doesn’t normally spit back during their fights unless Lance has got a good grip on him for a minute at least. It’s just them, the scraping ice, and jostling gear in this little circle, but outside James is surely pounding on the barrier to hype it up while they’re swinging.

“You wish,” Keith finally says defiantly, his thick eyebrows and angry curl of his lips are the most prominent of his features within such close proximity. It’d be intimate if they weren’t always at each other’s throats, but Lance doesn’t wanna think about that. He wants to think about how mister puck-hogger here let up on a whole three chances at letting Lance take the shot during their last game. And he doesn’t normally curse but _dammit_ ever since Keith’s skated across this ice like he owns it when they say they met, he’s been stepping all over Lance’s nerves because _he’s_ supposed to be the flowering prodigy here. But Keith doesn’t have to flower, no, cause he’s already good and sure is an asshole about it.

Lance pulls his hand back for a second to spit a wad of slimy, neon green gum from his mouth. He takes a couple blows while reaching for Keith’s head, but it’s his target right now and he’ll be damned if this gum doesn’t get all up in that insulting, Snape-esque hair.

“Lance, Keith! Break it up!” Shiro tries from somewhere outside Lance’s range of vision. It just makes Keith snarl, determined to claim his win but ohoho boy is he mistaken because someone’s gonna be getting a haircut this weekend when Lance tangles up his gum at the front in a horrendous, sticky mess.

He doesn’t see Keith’s eyes flash with realization until Shiro pushes them apart with ease from his ridiculously muscular log arms, and holds them at that distance like a pair of misbehaved children. Keith lifts his assaulted hair from the roots and looks at the dangling and knotted mess with disgust. “Eurghh, what the _fuck_ Lance?!”

Lance basks in the sight for a few good seconds, ignoring the fiery sensation that spreads angrily at his jaw and ice cold knuckles. The pain stings sharper by the second while Shiro scolds them, and he misses the warmth of his gloves that were flung off with their helmets moments ago.

He busies himself with checking the damage to his practice jersey in the midst of being lectured. There's a tear that stretches his collar and exposes crisp air to his skin just above his bulky padding. As goosebumps begin to rise from the bareness, he looks up at Keith, who sports a split lip from a hit Lance can’t remember. He’s still trying to undo the mess in his hair but to no avail, possibly even making it worse too.

The rest of their team creep near the outer edges of the rink, chirping in hushed voices, save for James who haughtily says, “ _Coulda landed some more if they weren’t such pussies_.” Idiot.

It’s not until Lance hears, “—or you’ll be suspended from the last game,” that he really starts paying attention to Shiro’s apparently newly improved lecture.

“ _What?!”_ He and Keith squawk together.

Shiro lets them go, albeit hesitantly, to cross his arms with a testing look to the both of them. “You heard me,” He says in a deep, assertive voice that tends to come out when he’s got less time to be friendly. No doubt that’s the case, Lance has lost count of how many arguments he’s got into with puck-hogger here.

“Wait- no Shiro, I didn’t-” he scrambles to make sense of what was left unheard.

“I _said_ ,” Shiro begins to repeat through a sigh, “you _both_ will be cleaning up your acts, or be suspended from the next game.”

Keith huffs and slides back on his skates with ease to get a good look at their coach. “But the next game is our _last_ game, unless we’re going to championships,” He says disbelievingly. The clump of gum hair has now been stubbornly brushed back, and the sight would be funny to Lance if he hadn’t heard Shiro’s new punishment terms.

“Which is exactly why there needs to be a change here,” Shiro says simply and pays no time for responses before moving on. “You both will have extra practice over the weekends, plus an additional hour after weekdays.”

Lance let out a breath. That’s not so bad.

“I expect you both to lock up once everything is finished, and send me photographic evidence to prove you’re training.”

Wait a minute…

“ _Wait_ we’re doing this—“

“—together?” Keith finishes with matching skepticism.

“I’m at my limit boys,” their coach says, low enough for only them to hear and it reeks of exasperation and… _disapproval._

Lance has spent the past three years here at Voltron University building his own hockey legacy. He’s spent even more time playing in general, and even _more_ vying for approval from his family, which seems to be the jack of all trades when it comes to talent. Everyone has their thing that they’re _good_ at, and it didn’t take until he was ten to find this sport. So having some random guy join their top team this season that comes head to head with him and has been playing since he was— what? Sixteen? It’s humiliating.

“Meet me in my office, Lance.”

And disappointing.

\\_ •

He’s back in his regular clothes: a pair of sweats and a loose T-shirt. His worn out grey sneakers scuff the carpet just in front of Shiro’s desk, and he feels a strange urge to take them off out of respect, a habit from his mother’s lecturing.

When Shiro arrives, his expression is muted as the door shuts behind him. His hair is neatly tousled- a look Lance can never seem to nail himself and it’s just another reason he admires this man. But Shiro doesn’t have the same idolizing attitude toward him, from the stiffness in his figure when he half sits half leans on his desk in front of Lance with a “We’ve been over this and I’m losing my patience” stare. He knows it because this is the fourth time his snappiness has landed him in this hard wooden chair that makes his ass feel bruised.

Instead of saying anything, Lance decides to remain silent in uncomfortable obedience while he cradles an ice pack to his jaw. His skin underneath tingles pleasantly at contact, but it’s coldness has his mind holding fast to the splintering air of the rink just ten minutes or so before. He’s faced Keith’s malice and clenched fists and enraged sneer before, has even gotten used to provoking such a sight, but if his mind sinks to the bottom of a pool of Keith-shaped memories, past shallow waters of petty angst, he remembers a version of the boy unlike any of the rest.

  
  


_“Did we winn?” He asked through a raspy breath, like he had just woken up from an achingly long nap, except the side of his head burns and buzzes with numbness at the same time._

_Keith’s face is obscured from his hazy vision, and he blinks like windshield wipers do to clear sight of the road ahead, trying his best to dazedly meet the other’s wild eyes. “Lance,” he says, low enough that the screeching ice and clanking barriers almost drown it out. Lance’s gut flutters, then does a 180 and sloshes unpleasantly. He suddenly feels nauseous._

_And as if Keith simply cannot help it, he laughs weakly. His smile lines crease at the corners of his mouth and lift the apples of his cheeks with an air of charm, framed by dangling tufts of hair from his loose ponytail. “We’re not even finished with the first period.”_

Yeah, the only time they had ever managed to get along was when Lance had been slammed so forcefully into the rink’s surrounding walls, he was nearly knocked unconscious, even with the thick shell of protection from his helmet. Keith helped bring his sluggish body to the exit, and when Lance droned _“Heyy, you better win for me, Kogane”_ , the boy had only chuckled and said _“I will, Lance.”_

And apparently, they did win.

“What happened at the U of A?” Shiro asked him curiously, tilting his head with an air of expectancy hanging from his folded arms and crossed ankles. It was like he could read Lance’s betraying mind.

“You already know what happened, you were there,” he counters and crosses his arms in defiance but it doesn’t do much for his swirling thoughts and mixed feelings.

He tries his best to distract himself, searching the office for something to entertain his eyes while ignoring this turning point in what must be intended as a heart to heart. But there are pictures— so many of them with faces too small to see or frames too blurry to comprehend but he _knows_ Keith is just _scoured_ everywhere, by the number on his jersey to dark hair underneath a graduation hat. He looks younger in that one, obviously, and jealousy claws at Lance’s reluctant throat because _he_ was never lucky enough to obtain such meaningful mentorship. He was only one of several people clambering around the ice, it didn't matter which team he was playing for. At best, he was a pain in the ass that played decent, at worst, well… he was just a pain in the ass.

Shiro turns his head for a brief moment to check the time, then turns back to him skeptically, looks like he’s got plenty. “Keith was worried about you,” he says, as if it’s not something he’s been told before.

“Yeah well, it's a good thing he doesn’t have to be anymore.” He avoids Shiro’s sincerity and keeps looking away, but his coach practically overflows with empathy and Lance feels guilty just taking up space right now.

_“Ryan’s graduating this year so I need you to pick things up for next season,” He overhears Shiro murmur to Keith from the penalty box. His mild concussion left him sitting there for nearly two hours everyday for practice, and no matter how many times he begged to join, it didn’t happen until he_ finally _got the OK from his doctor._

_He didn’t see Keith’s reaction either, Shiro was blocking the view by steadying himself against the entrance frame. He was heaving though, as well as the rest of the team, who lingered off to the side and sprayed water between heaving breaths because they had little patience to settle first._

_Keith must’ve made a face at that though, because Shiro continues in an even lower voice, “We’ve talked about this.”_

_And it felt like Lance had been spending all this time to impress for nothing._

“Your extra hours start next week.” Shiro sighs. Lance doesn’t have the time to get a good look at his face since his coach has turned away to sort through files on the shelf behind him. Lance wished he would’ve tried a little harder with the validation, but then again, he too would also give up on himself.

\\_ •

Avoiding Keith was like trying to avoid the wind; he weaved across campus while Lance would frantically usher himself to the next class or event on his schedule. They also share several classes, unfortunately, and when Lance would spot Keith a couple rows up, the undeniable urge to roll down that pesky jacket collar kept him miffed even without interaction. The worst part was Keith’s bangs, framing his heart shaped face and yanking the breath out of Lance when he walked into their lecture late.

Lance comes out of their fight with a bruise that overbears the left side of his jaw and painfully surges a constant headache that pulses to his temple. Keith just comes out _prettier_.

 _Team captain_ , his mind would supply with bitterness anytime there was a desire to just drop this cold shoulder altogether. Ryan was fit for them now, his voice held an air of authority and leadership, which their rowdy team surprisingly followed. Lance’s bias had since grown past their history of a few lust-driven run-ins last year, but he still zones out a bit during pep talks from staring at Ryan’s plump lips a little too long.

He’d rather let the team chop him into pieces with the blades of their skates before admitting that Keith has the same quiet energy, and god is it difficult to resist the thought of diving past it less out of agitation and more out of—

God, this is _not good_.

When his gaze is drawn back to Keith, who’s in his usual place toward the classroom door, he can tell by the way his own heart clenches that it’s going to be a long couple of weeks. Keith has his hair tied back as he usually did before the gum incident, and it still has the same effect, if not stronger on Lance when he sees him tucking a few strands away behind his ear. And as if these circumstances couldn’t make him feel any more frustrated with himself, it’s that moment when Keith decides to look in his direction, to where he may as well be _dreamily_ staring with a cheek propped in his hand.

Lance doesn’t have time to process Keith’s reaction to catching him laying his troubled heart out bare on the cluttered desk, he frantically looks back to the front board with scrawled words he can’t read but pretends to anyway. And just to make the situation feel less awkward, he makes himself stretch back dramatically in his chair, his toes curling from sudden relief in his cramped legs all the way to fluttering his hands in the space behind himself, where Nyma is sitting and _still_ texting.

She bops him on the nose with the tip of her pencil once his head hangs back, and an amused smile tugs on those gloss coated lips. She’s cute as hell, long and thin blonde hair swept over exposed shoulders from a low hanging tank top, but out of respect and downright infatuation, his eyes stay trained on her ridiculously green ones. They’d make a good pair if they both weren’t such slackers, plus the girl’s got a boyfriend. So timidly, a small hope begins to linger and override the rest of his thoughts, a hope that Keith sees this puppy love and experiences at least an ounce of jealousy that Lance has.

“Alright that’s the end of this lesson, I know I haven’t put your last test grades in and I probably won’t for the next month so stop asking,” Their professor says lousily with no bite. And just like that, Lance closes his own interaction with Nyma with a cheeky wink and swings back into place.

He goes to chance a glance in Keith’s direction, but the view is obscured by something— or more like _someone_ much closer. Speak of the devil though, when he looks up Keith’s looming over him expectantly, one hand drumming its fingers against the strap of his bag.

“Whatdyou want, mullet?” he bites with the first insulting word that comes to mind. Mullet? Seriously? He’s seriously a freaking idiot.

Keith must have the same feeling because he dismisses the dig by rolling his eyes, unamused. It’s the complete opposite of Nyma’s radiant friendliness, but somehow Keith merely being within the span of a few feet without almost knocking a tooth out of him has his heart beating like there’s no tomorrow.

“What time are we practicing over the weekends?” The weekends? Their punishment starts in only a couple days or so, but they’d have plenty of time to make arrangements when it comes around.

He wants to believe Keith is dwelling on more than just this, but the boy is so reserved Lance has little hope in believing that. “We don’t have to worry about that for a while though,” He says anyway while busying himself with packing up. The bustling students around them provide a weird sense of relief, because he knows if they’re one of the last ones in the classroom he’ll be driven out of his mind over this even more. Drop the talk and get out of there.

“Still,” Keith counters simply. “Didn’t think you’d read texts from me anyway.”

He would definitely read them. Replying, though? Give him at least, like, five hours to come up with a response that gives off a chill vibe but also screams _‘please keep talking to me’_. “Just use snapchat, texting is too intimate,” he suggests, knowing it’ll tick Keith off even more, but what’s the damage at this point?

Keith’s eye twitches as he takes a deep breath, clearly having his patience tested. His chest expands that plain as hell T-shirt, yet Lance can’t help but let his stare flick down for a moment, then back to Keith’s eyes with a smirk. What? Clearly he’s only getting a kick out of the banter, of course.

“I don’t have snapchat,” Keith murmurs and tightens his hold on the backpack strap. Students are still packing up their belongings, and Lance has just zipped up his bag. He stands, shuffling in front of the desk to sit on it’s low surface. The stance briefly reminds him of Shiro’s approach during his lecture. _“What happened at the U of A?”_

 _Nothing_ , his irritable mind insists. But there’s no way of going about this, he’s hanging onto a branch and getting pulled lower into quicksand, closer to admitting to himself that it’s not like Keith asked for this. At least from what he knows. _“Keith was worried about you,”_ his troubled heart recalls only a second later, and the sand is reaching his knees.

Everything about the Keith in his head shouts: _Asshole! Show off! Hothead! Rival!_ But the one in front of him just says… _nervous_. Whatever, he hurt Lance’s pretty face anyway so technically, they all can be right. “Then make one.” He heads for the door but Keith is already on his tail.

“Can’t we just sort this out _now_?” He tries, but Lance is oh so stubborn.

“No. I’ll give you my username, though.”

“I don’t have spare paper,” He admits. Right, he takes notes on his laptop and _duh_ Lance has taken notice of that.

He writes it in marker on Keith’s wrist: _sharpshooter07_. A couple people walking by must think he’s giving his number, because they whistle and mutter things like “About time…” under their breaths. Even Professor Coran has a glimmer in his eyes when he sends a wink to Lance on his way out for lunch. For god’s sake the only reason they’ve already got each other’s number from that stupid hockey group chat, and it keeps him from retaliating and blocking Keith out of sheer denial. Shiro gives them updates of course, but the other half is just James and his fragile masculinity. That man would be a close second to his beef with Keith if he wasn’t such an airhead.

\\_ •

His plan to keep Keith at arm’s length, maybe even past that, is turned to shreds when he’s bombarded with constant texts over the weekend on just how “this stupid app” works. Apparently handling social media other than his long abandoned Instagram from 2014 (don’t ask how Lance knows) has Keith undergoing some sort of pissy crisis. It’s amusing, nonetheless.

**Keith**

**Today** 5:02 PM

_How do I get rid of the heart next to your name?_

_well what are you trying to change my name to_

_Lance_

_what_

_No I’m changing it to just Lance_

_no that’s boring_

_🚫🚨 wrong, try again_

_Why are you so dramatic_

_Can’t we just text the arrangement_

_why do you have a mullet_

_no we’re not friends like that_

_I don’t care. 5pm take it or leave it._

  
  


What an asshole. And it’s kind of sad how Lance hoped some familiar banter will get this guy to loosen up, but clearly not. Keith may as well be playing with a hockey stick up his ass instead of in his hands while he’s at it.

Lance takes the offer _-is it even an offer?-_ anyway, albeit reluctantly. He actually waits a few more hours before finally sending off what he hopes to be the snarkiest _“fine.”_ you could read over text, but of course Keith one ups him by not responding at all. Honestly with Keith sparing him no mercy, Lance is starting to believe his own reason behind all this madness is actually valid, not that he didn’t before. Like hitting your sibling (for a good reason) and getting smacked back harder, okay not exactly the _best_ analogy but it sums up his wincing pain quite well. He wonders if Keith has any siblings, and then already starts to feel bad for them.

Well 5PM can wait, because 4:30 on weekdays is what’s coming first.

**Author's Note:**

> [socials](https://linktr.ee/arcadevia)


End file.
